What is the main content of Confucianism?

The essence of Confucianism is to advocate "benevolence", with "benevolence" as the core, and "benevolence" is "love". Put forward such arguments as "don't do to others what you don't want others to do to you", advocate the principle of "loyalty and forgiveness", and think that the implementation of "benevolent policy" should be based on "courtesy".

It emphasizes the combination of "learning" and "thinking", and puts forward the viewpoints of "learning without thinking is useless, thinking without learning is dangerous" and "reviewing the old and learning the new". Zhang Yiren filial piety governs the country, pays attention to people's self-cultivation and establishes harmonious relations with people around him.

Second, the significance

As the most influential school of thought in ancient China, Confucianism represented the foundation of feudalism. Confucianism maintained social morality to a certain extent, condensed its strength in the chaos and became the largest cultural core in ancient China.

At the same time, Confucius, the founder of the Confucian school, broke the monopoly of the old ruling class on education for the first time, turned learning into teaching in the government, popularized traditional cultural education to the whole nation, and laid a solid national psychological foundation for the whole nation.

Today, Confucianism is still the core value that many people in China believe in, which makes it an important symbol of China's culture and national tradition.

Third, the impact

Confucianism put forward a series of moral categories, ideas and thoughts, which enriched China's traditional moral treasure house. At the same time, it shaped the traditional moral quality of China people. The people-oriented principle of "people-oriented is the foundation of the country" embodies the social responsibility of taking the world as its own responsibility.

Paying attention to the appeal and cohesion of ideals and beliefs has become a major feature and political advantage of China's rule of virtue. The dialectical thinking of "going too far is too late" embodies the superb way of dealing with the world and the art of leadership. Rich educational thoughts have become the main content of the excellent educational tradition of the Chinese nation and still inspire modern quality education.

Of course, there are also negative effects. Confucianism serves the feudal superstitious political system and is a theory with religious superstition. It was a tool used by the feudal statistical class to publicize the unified thought and consolidate the centralized position of the emperor.

Among them, "three cardinal guides and five permanents" is the center of feudal ethics. After Confucianism became the orthodoxy of China, it deprived a hundred schools of thought of their right to freely publicize their academic thoughts and political opinions, hindered the development of other cultures and seriously bound people's thoughts.

Extended data:

The Formation and Development of Confucianism

1, Confucius is the founder of Confucianism, and his "benevolence" has the nature of classical humanitarianism: advocating "rites" and safeguarding the rites of Zhou, which is a conservative part of Confucius' political thought. Confucian culture later developed into the orthodox culture in ancient China.

2. Mencius was the representative of Confucianism in the Warring States Period. He advocated benevolent government and put forward the idea of "valuing the people and despising the monarch". Advocate "politics depends on the people" and oppose tyranny; It advocates giving farmers a certain amount of land, not infringing on farmers' working hours, and lenient punishment and thin taxes.

3. In the Western Han Dynasty, Dong Zhongshu founded Neo-Confucianism on the basis of Confucianism, with the framework of Yin-Yang and Five Elements, and with the method of letting a hundred schools of thought contend. Its core is "the unity of heaven and man" and "the divine right of monarchy". His thoughts focused on the three policies of heaven and man and many exposures in the Spring and Autumn Period.

4. Metaphysics, which appeared in Wei and Jin Dynasties, explained the Confucian Book of Changes with Laozi and Zhuangzi, which was a negative thought to defend the gentry. Zhouyi, Laozi and Zhuangzi are called "San Xuan".

Metaphysics advocates the inaction of the monarch and the dictatorship of the gate valve, and its main activity is in Luoyang. Representative figures are Yanhe, Wang Bi and Seven Sages of Bamboo Forest.

5. Han Yu, a master of Confucianism in the middle Tang Dynasty, set out from maintaining feudal rule and opposed the views of Buddhism and Taoism with Confucian theory of destiny and feudal law.

6. Neo-Confucianism in Song Dynasty. Neo-Confucianism, based on Confucianism and absorbing Buddhism and Taoism, is the main philosophical thought of the Song Dynasty. Zhu is a master of the development of Neo-Confucianism, and he inherited the thoughts of Cheng Hao and Cheng Yi, the Northern Song Neo-Confucianists.

It further improved and developed the neo-Confucianism system of objective idealism, which was later called Zhu Cheng Neo-Confucianism. Its core content: "reason" is the origin of all things in the universe and is the first; "Qi" is the substance that constitutes all things in the universe, and it is secondary.

He put "righteousness" and "human desire" in opposition, thinking that human desire is the root of all evil, so he put forward "preserving righteousness and destroying human desire"

7. In the mid-Ming Dynasty, Wang Yangming opposed Zhu's view that mind and reason are two different things, and founded a subjective idealism theory opposite to Zhu-the theory of mind. The evolution of Neo-Confucianism from objective idealism to subjective idealism shows that it has gone to extremes.

Baidu Encyclopedia-Confucianism